Friday, November 30, 2012

Six year old daughter loves craft. I have moved her little desk into her room now for her to enjoy. I put a protective rug on our cream colour carpet. The toy box was given to us by Fiona who painted it as well.

Monday, November 26, 2012

This was last Friday, at Lucy's house. Wonderful sausage, ham, bread, cheeses, salmon, greens, sundried tomatoes, chocolates and fruit.
The company was wonderful, there was laughter and the view of trees.

I saw stollen in the shops and have bought one for husband E to nibble on. It is not as good as the ones my mother finds, so we will wait for them. I have also bought this cake tin, the stollen is inside! It has the sort of Christmas scene on it that I remember from cards/wrapping paper when I was a child.

Thursday, November 22, 2012

Aunty L recommended a pressure cooker to me. I have bought one. We can have risotto in six minutes and casseroles in 30 minutes. She told me how to do a roast chicken in the pressure cooker. These pressure cookers have a wonderful browning capacity. I browned the chicken after stuffing it with lemon and thyme and seasoning it.
Then I added a cup of stock, more thyme and lemon and raised the chicken on a trivet. It cooked for 30minutes.
I browned it a little again at the end of the cooking time. It was delicious, very moist.
I love the fact that a proper meal can be thought of and prepared in such a short amount of time.

The Christmas pudding is mixed and boiled. A few local ladies and I attend a pudding making day at my sister in law's church. The lovely ladies there pre measure all our ingredients. We all mix together and enjoy afternoon tea. There is also a speaker each year who encourages us to remember the birth of Christ and the joy that we celebrate at Christmas because of that.

Our first born turned 14 last week. 10 year old sister had gone to a lot of trouble to get his present wrapped before the event. The younger two had made beautiful cards for him to enjoy.
We enjoyed lots of seafood for dinner, we started eating at 5pm and stopped at about 9pm.

Fiona has blogged about "Stretching". We are blessed to be able to try new things, access new skills and use our God given gifts in various ways.

For me, I feel as though my research into learning difficulties is opening up many opportunities to learn more myself as I read a variety of books.
Even, baking fruit cake this week... a first really for me. It was not a complicated recipe though:

Quick Fruit Cake

375g mixed fruit
1 cup orange juice
1 cup SR flour.

Soak the fruit in the orange juice for as long as you can. Add the flour. Pour into a lined tin. I then covered mine with foil. Bake till cooked. Sorry I don't know how long it took. I then glazed this one with a lemon butter bought at the supermarket. There was nothing very butterish about it, it was more like a marmalade.

This recipe came from our minister's wife at the church where husband E and I had met and were married.

Monday, November 5, 2012

30 years in Australia was marked by a ceremony where our family's names were engraved on "The Welcome Wall" with many others. We then enjoyed lunch at a French restaurant. 13 year old son was adventurous and tried snails. He did not finish them, but enjoyed the experience. 8 year old daughter quite liked them.